Are you getting the service that you require from your domain registrar?
Actually, thinking about it for a minute, it might be a better question to
ask, do you even know what services are available? Are you aware that you
can shop around and get better prices, more features and far better customer
service?

Guess what? All domain registrars are not the same.

Okay, let’s back up a minute. Way back when the internet was young (maybe 5
years ago) all domain names were handled by Network Solutions, Inc. In those
dark, evil days you had no choice. It didn’t matter what you thought of the
process, it was unimportant that you were not getting service and the price,
well, was a standard high fee.

A few years ago the government decided that Network Solutions would no
longer be a monopoly. The government wanted to do this to deregulate the
industry and encourage competition, and also perhaps to spur a little bit of
growth into this thing called the internet.

Okay, so now you do have a choice. In fact, there are well over a hundred
different domain registrars at last count. They seem to be springing up all
over the place, and the level of support and service, as well as the price,
seems to vary greatly.

You may not know it, but you can change domain registrars at any time. It’s
actually not very complicated at all.

Here are some of the questions that you may have regarding domain transfers.

How much does it cost?

It depends upon the domain registrar. I have found that many will transfer
your domain for no cost to get your business. Others will charge a few
dollars ($5 to $20 or more), but will drop the fee if you extend your domain
for a couple of years. Shop around and find a good deal.

What are the advantages of transferring?

You may not like the domain registrar you are currently using - perhaps they
have poor support or cost too much. You can shop around and find the best
solution for your needs.

Remember, though, that if you are like most people, domain registration is
something you will not do very often, so perhaps customer support is not all
that important.

What are the disadvantages?

Transferring a domain can be confusing. Also, there is no guarantee that the
new registrar will be any better than the old one. Again, remember that
domain registration is not something that you should need to deal with very
often (if you are like most people) so it may not be worth the effort to
change.

Can any domain be transferred?

Yes, any domain registered with any registrar may be transferred to any
other registrar.

What does a registrar do?

The registrar manages your domain name. They maintain security and the
structures that make the domain work.

Does changing registrars have any effect on ownership?

No. When you change registrars you are only changing managers. You still
retain ownership.

Are there reasons why a domain may not be transferred?

Yes. Some of these are listed below.

- The domain name is in a legal dispute of some kind.
- The identity of the domain name holder is in dispute or unknown.
- The domain name holder is in bankruptcy.
- The domain has only been with the registrar for 60 days.
- The registrar refuses to transfer for other reasons.

How is a domain transferred?

This varies from registrar to registrar. Some require a notarized form to be
delivered to them, others can do it using a web site form.
How long does the process take?

The registrar will usually take five to ten days to review and validate the
request. Once it has been validated and put into action, it will take a
couple of days for the change to filter through the internet.

Will the web site associated with the domain be accessible during the
change?

Yes. This normally does not effect access to your web site. The registrar is
changed, not the web site address and other information.

About the Author
Richard Lowe Jr. is the webmaster of Internet Tips And Secrets at
http://www.internet-tips.net - Visit our website any time to read
over 1,000 complete FREE articles about how to improve your
internet profits, enjoyment and knowledge.
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Thousands of domain names expire everyday and can be used by others. If you want more traffic or want to resell the domains for profit, these expired ones can be a valuable resource.

An expired domain may have been used by one or more persons in the past. They may have designed a website, advertised it, linked it to search engines, done business deals on it and even had reciprocal link connections with other websites.

Why are valuable domains ever allowed to expire?

Many reasons, including but not limited to:

Not enough funds to renew them
Invalid contact e-mail address
Loss of interest in online world
Closing down of business
Lack of knowledge about value of domain names
Being away at time of domain renewal

There may have been any of the aforementioned reasons or any other cause, but whatever the case, the domain is now an available option for you. You can use it by designing a website on it or divert traffic to your existing website.

The main advantage of taking over an expired domain is the traffic. There may still be visitors who, on finding the better alternative offered by you, can redirect their business. It is not impossible to know the exact amount to expired traffic to a particular domain. However, the analysis of some specific aspects lets you gauge the amount of expired traffic. They are as follows :

LINK POPULARITY

This will give you an estimate of the number of portals or web pages that are linked to the expired domain. The more the number of links, the higher is the possibility of future traffic. Also, a higher link popularity betters the probability of quality traffic.

ALEXA RANK

An Alexa toolbar keeps tabs on the number of hits for a domain and then awards a rank based on this. If the site has had no traffic for the past three months, it is automatically dropped by Alexa. So, look for an Alexa rank to get an idea about the number of visits and the domain’s worth.

GOOGLE PAGERANK

The PageRank is a value that Google gives to a web page, based on the number of and quality of incoming links.

The popularity of a web page is ranked on a scale of 1 to 10 and this is called a Google PageRank. This ranking system takes into account the number of quality web pages that have links to the web page. Normally the homepage of a web page would have the highest PageRank.

About PageRank, Google says:

“The heart of our software is PageRank(tm), a system for ranking web pages developed by our founders Larry Page and surgery Brin at Stanford University. And while we have dozens of engineers working to improve every aspect of Google on a daily basis, PageRank continues to provide the basis for all of our web search tools.”

A Google toolbar is required to obtain a Google PageRank. You can type in the website name in the address bar of your browser and get the PageRank.

YAHOO AND DMOZ LISTINGS

A domain may have been indexed by search engines. The domain owner may have paid for registrations on search engines like Yahoo and LookSmart. A domain also may have been approved by a Dmoz editor. If you take over a domain, these listings are automatically transferred to you. You can do your own research by visiting these search engines and typing the full URL in the directories section. Your results page will show you whether the domain is listed with them or not.

An inclusion in the top search engines does not ensure continuous visits but it certainly increases the chances of receiving worthy traffic. If you do not want to use the domains yourself, you can easily turn it around and sell it. It will certainly be profitable if the domain is registered with the top ten search engines.

WHERE TO GET THOSE DOMAINS?

There are many sources but the author considers ExpiredDomains.com to be the best where he managed to get many valuable domains.

Happy hunting!

About The Author:
Ainuddin Mohamad is the Webmaster of http://www.BestWebsites.com.my which is a Directory of Best websites. Since 1998 http://BestWebsites.com.my has featured thousands of best websites in many categories of interest with descriptions/reviews given by leading publications and webmasters.

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How can you choose the best domain for the efficiency of your offline and online marketing? Brand name versus business name. Hyphenated or not? Which is the Host Server for your new website?
1) What is a domain name ?
A domain name is the location of your website on the internet, it is also the location of your company, or your private enterprise in the immense internet market. In case a domain name named the same with your offline brand name, location, hotel or restaurant, tour specialist, local region or community which is well-known in tourism market, you have had a big advantage than different competitor. Because of:
* You will receive targeted visitor tourism your website, For example: You are a travel company who supply some kind of Trekking tour in the favorite Nepal, your chosen domain name should be: Nepal Trekkingtour Nepal-trekkingtour Besttrekking-Nepal… and so on Visitor will find very easily to communicate with a travel company which has the name is the description of the kind of services they are finding, and you will better in persuading your client because they are all prospect visitor. * Your website will be listed in Yahoo! In Travel Directory and other Search Engine results. Imagine when a visitor want to spend a trekking tour in Nepal, he decides to search internet to find a good supply among a thousand of sites. He chose Google, for example, and enter keyword of his wish: ” Nepal + trekking tour”. And a a result of choosing a right target domain name, your website URL and a short description will appear at the sight and he clicks.
But remember, whether he chooses your services or not depend on a process of building credibility which originate from: your site design, your respond, the price, your level of professional and much more…
But you have had an advantage when you have chosen a right domain and your prospect client has seen you among thousand of competitor. 2) Domain name extension: .com
Each domain has what’s called an extension. The most well known of these extensions is .com. This extension is encouraged to be used most, because it is tightened in the mind of all the people around the world. All the surfers tend to enter it after almost domain name. So because it long time used at the beginning of internet era so it difficult to chose a good domain name. COM. .net
If you can’t find your preferred .com domain name you could always choose the same domain with a .net extension. It might not have the same ring as a .com but is still as just useful as a .com. .org
These domain extensions were originally designed for educational and more formal websites. As a tourism organization, we can use it. But all of it are enterprise such as hotel or travel company… it is not recommend to chose it. .info
A more recent introduction to the domain name game are .info domains. Many of the valuable .info domains were bought up overnight but there’s still a huge range of good .info domains available. Bear in mind that most web. Not recommended.
.travel
This is a newcomer, we can use it well because it is to identify all the tourism and hospitality website. A new rule…
There a great article about “.travel” by the link below:
http://www.tourism-internetmarketing.com/ITtourism/1/20.htm
There are many region extension: uk, us, vn, … which is suite for your online tourism partner to used to indicate our region location and services. It also an advantage for inbound tourism and hospitality supply. A visitor is seem to put his truth on a local professional supply, certainly! 3) Brand name versus Business name: We are hardly to know exactly whether to chose a domain name actually reflect our real business or establish a new brand name online and promote it. A right choice is base on your own case after give a careful consideration on marketing strategy of our company. If you are a well-known company who want to target the inbound visitors, get your long time famous brand name is the right choice. Because your client will see it easy for them to find your web and remember it as you are famous ih their mind.
But if you want to take advantage of the global market, a business name enclose with the region maybe a better choice.
Try to register a domain which contains a popular keyword applicable for your industry. This will help your customers remember your domain name better. Furthermore, for searches conducted in Yahoo!, a higher ranking will be given to those web sites which contain the keywords in the title. And according to Yahoo!’s instructions, the Title should always be the official name of the site. Thus, if the domain name contains a keyword, you will be able to include the keyword in the Title which will improve your ranking in Yahoo!. As a minor side-benefit, this can also help to increase the ranking of your web site in some search engines.
There is a great resource for Tourism internet marketing in Tourism Marketing Forum. Click the link below to get a forum account to read this resources: <http://s12.invisionfree.com/TOURISM_MARKETING/index.php?act=Reg&CODE=00> 4) Hyphenated or not This is another area of debate. Should your domain be one single word or should the words be separated by hyphens? There are advantages and disadvantages to both approaches. Single word domain names can be easier to explain, use on header paper and lend themselves to brand names very well.
Single word domains are in very, very short supply.
Hyphenated domains names can be slightly more difficult to explain, may not look as well on headed paper and possibly harder to establish as a brand name. There’s no shortage of multiple word domains.
The single biggest advantage a hyphenated domain has is that searche engines can “read” the domain more easily. For example in a domain like www.foreignholidaysonline.com the search engine can only read the first word “foreign” and that’s it. It can’t tell anything else about the website domain name. If you hyphenated that to www.foreign-holidays-online.com the search engine can read “foreign”, “holidays” and “online” as separate words and therefore knows that this website is about foreign holidays.
A well chosen hyphenated domain name can be just as effective as a single word domain name.
5) Don’t make your primary domain too long. Even though 67 character domains are a reality, exactly how many of your users will want to type a domain name like thebesttrekkingtourinnepal.com?
6) Chose the supplier: There are many domain suppliers waiting for you out there online, the best choice is find out a well-known web servers who always supply the services Domain name registration. A good domain name .com will can be get at the price of 15 $, but you can buy it cheaper as the price of 7,95$.
Are there any disadvantages in using a discount domain registrar? Will it affect your website in any way? The answer to both is a definite No.
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This article can be freely reprinted and distributed world widely as its content and author biography must keep intact.
There is a great resource for Tourism internet marketing in Tourism Marketing Forum. Click the link below to get a forum account to read this resources: <http://s12.invisionfree.com/TOURISM_MARKETING/index.php?act=Reg&CODE=00>.

About the Author
David Kan CEO of T-IM.com T-IM.com is the largest global Free tourism internet marketing resources with 57 & more online tools and forum to help tourism industry enhance their internet marketing result. Http://www.tourism-internetmarketing.com

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